Weddingbee Blog

Mr. Hummingbird and I met in a mall. That sounds kind of lame, but it’s true. We met at a Second Cup in a mall near my parents’ house in The Saug (a suburb outside of Toronto). The meeting had been pre-arranged after we “met” and talked on the Internet for the month prior. It was a very weird thing.

This was partially because I was in a weird place in my life. I had just split from a boyfriend not too long before and I was still working the crappy retail job that I’d worked for the past three years to pay for college, so pretty much my whole life felt transient. Although I really liked the way Mr. Hummingbird sounded in e-mails, would it be as good in person and was I ready to be pulled into a relationship if that was the way things went?

Our first meeting was also kind of weird in that when I sat down to have coffee with him, it was kind of like sitting down next to someone you’ve known your whole life. The conversation was easy, we had a very similar sense of humour and we both seemed interested in what the other person was saying.

And then he called me “delightful.”

I had no idea what to make of it. I’d been called hot or pretty or nice or sweet before but delightful was new. It wasn’t a complete brush off but it wasn’t a come on, so I couldn’t quite read his intentions.

So we went out again. Again with the easy conversation and the laughing and the delightful. He was cool as a cucumber and I felt like a ball of nerves. I was stumped. We made plans to go out a third time - this time to the zoo.

On the third date, it finally became clear to me that Mr. Hummingbird was experiencing the same kind of nervous confusion I was. Though he was his charming self, he seemed a little more scattered and twitchy than he had on our first two outings. It was when we were walking towards the Africa Pavillion, things finally started happening.

“Ah screw it, I’m going in!” he announced and he took my hand for the first time.

At the end of the date, we shared our first kiss which, even though it had taken three dates to happen, was definitely worth the wait.

From there on out, it seemed like we were both on the same wavelength. After squeezing in a fourth date, I was up North at a big Hummingbird family reunion, hobnobbing with his relatives. Looking back, I have no idea how I did that. Logically, going off with someone that soon after you start dating them is kind of insane (I’m pretty sure Mr. Hummingbird’s family thought so when I showed up, some crazy fifth date internet girl crashing the party), but at the time, it seemed like the right thing to do, so off I went.

That family reunion was July of 2004 and we haven’t looked back since.

It’s funny sometimes, when someone comes into your life, you’re never sure who they’re going to be to you and what path you might end up taking together. I mean sure, sometimes it doesn’t work out, heck, most of the time it doesn’t and you end up parting ways, but that one time it does is pretty great.

So God bless the mall, eh?